Lessons learned during the pandemic...

[K_W]

About your preps? - Mostly unprepared. We had prepped and practiced for property crime, severe weather, get-out-of-town, and extended power loss... not a pandemic with extended absence of basics due to idiots. We have been able to adapt so far with minimal fuss.

About your hardware? - Set.

About your skills/training? - We're healthy, well fed, still employed, and observing events closely.

About other preparedness? - Financials good, neighbor relations good, family helping eachother

 

[DoggyDaddy]

Where did you buy your Wise buckets? We have MREs and are looking to expand that area of preps so I've been looking for good deals on main course buckets.

I've slept since then, but IIRC, I got them from Sportsman's Guide. I'm a club member so I probably got free shipping.

 

[spencer rifle]

Had our MSG meeting and modified our communications and movement plans.

As for Wise food buckets: Might want to concentrate on the dinners. Breakfast/lunch stuff can be had elsewhere cheaper - powdered milk, oatmeal, sugar/honey, etc. A lot of the breakfast/lunch foods are more like luxury items (dried strawberries) and not as calorie-dense at the dinners.

 

[Car Ramrod]

What have you learned during the pandemic?

About your preps?

About your hardware?

About your skills/training?

About other preparedness?




Note - Everyone loves clever comedy and joking responses. There are lots of threads for that. It would be great if we could keep this thread on point to be productive for one and all.
Thanks!

I have kind of let my efforts slack over the years, but I never completely stopped. I had some items left on my to-do list that kept getting pushed off. I feel I got very lucky and was able to make it to the stores before everyone else made the mad rush. While I was buying food and other items, people were buying water and toilet paper, which, I did not buy any toilet paper. This is an item I knew would be something I would want to keep on the shelf, from the day I started looking out for myself and being prepared. I bought a case from Sam's Club and have had it tucked in the closet with my other supplies for several years now. I also travel for work and stay in a lot of hotels; I bring home the new rolls of toilet paper from the room whenever I can. This has given me a pretty good back stock of white gold. I have also learned that you never know when something will lead to the shelves being bare and you don't want to wait until tomorrow to do your grocery shopping. I am also amazed at all of the things you would never think would be bare; ice cream, tacos/tortillas, canned biscuits, microwave popcorn.

I'm hoping my wife finally had a moment of clarity as to why I do this when we had some neighbors over the other night to sit around the fire pit and get out of the house. They mentioned that with all the pasta and rice gone that they had better not see anyone at an Italian or Asian restaurant after they open back up as they weren't able to find any rice anywhere. I laughed a bit in my head about the pounds and pounds and pounds of rice I had stored away over the years... It would be nice to know if there are like minded individuals in the neighborhood, but there is no good way to approach the subject without risking opsec.


I feel like this was a bit of a wake up call and I have taken some time to focus on getting some things in order. I have plenty of fuel, I finally built my Berkey-esque water filter, food supply is good for a while, I just bought a deep freeze and it is amply stocked with food for me, my wife, and our 3 year old. I will always want more, but I am comfortable with what we have. I would have liked to picked up more pasta, pasta sauce, tortillas, and cereal before they all disappeared but I will work on getting more of these put away after they become readily available again. I will also look into a bigger supply of long term, worst case meals.

Hardware is good. I now have my 2m base radio set up. I don't actively use it, but it's nice to have the option.

I could always use more training, but for now I feel like I am adequately equipped for us to stay in the house for a couple weeks and come out of this no different than before it happened.


This has definitely been a learning experience and I am already making note of things I wish I had and would maybe have done differently. I am not glad it happened, but I am happy that it has pushed me to get some more things done and in place.

 

[Car Ramrod]

Had our MSG meeting and modified our communications and movement plans.

As for Wise food buckets: Might want to concentrate on the dinners. Breakfast/lunch stuff can be had elsewhere cheaper - powdered milk, oatmeal, sugar/honey, etc. A lot of the breakfast/lunch foods are more like luxury items (dried strawberries) and not as calorie-dense at the dinners.

If it came down to it, I have no issues eating a Spaghetti with Meat Sauce meal, for breakfast.

 

[chef1231]

I realized that I didn't know what I didn't know. It never occurred to me that something like this would happen at this large of a scale. Who knew that TP, bleach, rubbing alcohol, kids medicine would be gone... I get food and water I think that was just a given but the rest is surprising. Just like everything else in life though this lesson was learned the hard way and will not be a problem again.

 

[Phase2]

Our kids will largely be learning those lessons...

 

[spencer rifle]

We made bleach with pool shock this week. Had to go to a neighbor's house to get city water, since our well water just seems to cancel out the chemical. We have enough pool shock to make about another 30,000 gallons.

Got alcohol, nitrile gloves, zinc tablets and playing cards two weeks ago at Walgreens during their buy one get one half off sale. Found some toilet paper at Dollar General a few days ago, but we have plenty.

Big mistake of the past month - not moving IRAs into a bond fund several weeks ago.

 

[maxwelhse]

Big mistake of the past month - not moving IRAs into a bond fund several weeks ago.

My bond fund is down 20% as of right now. The next time something like this comes up, I'll be in 100% cash as fast as possible.

 

[woowoo2]

Lesson learned:
Check the storm shelter.
I packed away a lot of what I now need years ago...

 

[Thor]

I learned it's good to be a preper.

 

[spencer rifle]

My bond fund is down 20% as of right now. The next time something like this comes up, I'll be in 100% cash as fast as possible.

Our bond fund is up more than 14% YTD

 

[maxwelhse]

Our bond fund is up more than 14% YTD

I'm clearly in the wrong bond fund... I fell for the marketing of literally being advertised as a DEFENSIVE BOND ETF against exactly this kind of market. The guys managing it should be shot and my money won't be staying there if I ever get the chance to recover it all and move it elsewhere.

I'm still going all cash next time if I see it come down the line. I was stupid this time.

 

[Expat]

I'm clearly in the wrong bond fund... I fell for the marketing of literally being advertised as a DEFENSIVE BOND ETF against exactly this kind of market. The guys managing it should be shot and my money won't be staying there if I ever get the chance to recover it all and move it elsewhere.

I'm still going all cash next time if I see it come down the line. I was stupid this time.

I wish I had moved quicker. I guess I kept thinking if I am in a mutual fund, they will do something to stop the bleeding. Apparently not.

 

[DoggyDaddy]

This is what I'm doing with my 401Ks...

 

[80quercus]

This is a good investment opportunity...eventually.

I'm clearly in the wrong bond fund... I fell for the marketing of literally being advertised as a DEFENSIVE BOND ETF against exactly this kind of market. The guys managing it should be shot and my money won't be staying there if I ever get the chance to recover it all and move it elsewhere.

I'm still going all cash next time if I see it come down the line. I was stupid this time.

Bond funds come in different flavors and I suspect you had a junk bond fund, usually misleadingly sold as high yield or high income...until the SHTF. I had an emerging market bond fund that lost 15% so I just sold it as I think it will lose much more in this environment. But I exchanged to balanced funds to get my money back instead of cash where I never will. Sure it might take a couple years but I'm patient. Most of my traditional corporate funds are OK but I suspect the previous poster who says their's is up 20% for the year look at the date that that rate is posted as there is often a lag in reporting and you need to be careful. It may be early but now... meaning the next few months is the time to get back into stocks as this is when the money is made. There is no money to be made over time in cash with current interest rates. Warren Buffett is buying I suspect!

 

[maxwelhse]

Bond funds come in different flavors and I suspect you had a junk bond fund, usually misleadingly sold as high yield or high income...until the SHTF. I had an emerging market bond fund that lost 15% so I just sold it as I think it will lose much more in this environment. But I exchanged to balanced funds to get my money back instead of cash where I never will. Sure it might take a couple years but I'm patient. Most of my traditional corporate funds are OK but I suspect the previous poster who says their's is up 20% for the year look at the date that that rate is posted as there is often a lag in reporting and you need to be careful. It may be early but now... meaning the next few months is the time to get back into stocks as this is when the money is made. There is no money to be made over time in cash with current interest rates. Warren Buffett is buying I suspect!

We have a financial thread going too (What are you doing in the stock market... I think), and I think this thread we're in will be important for the future, so I don't want to get too off topic over here and get any more cluttered up. I would genuinely like to discuss all of that more with you, but over there.

So... To bring it back around a little closer to on topic: if I see some weirdo virus or other SHTF type of stuff going on somewhere in the world, I'm going to be much more careful about what I have my money locked into. That's a big thing I learned that I would have never considered part of my preps, but it is, because now I'm in a tighter spot than I'd like to be in.

 

[K_W]

This is what I'm doing with my 401Ks...

If America is anything, it is resilient... we will come back from this... unless Biden/Bernie is elected and we lose the Senate.

 

[SwikLS]

I learned it costs $1200 to turn a capitalist into a socialist.

 

[cosermann]

Some preps need to be better organized. Feel like I pretty much have what I need, but it needs to be better organized.